Transport Marines!

[bcantwell]

One things I've been looking at for local games is to tweak a few of the less commonly used special actions to make the more useful. Transport Marines is seldom used in ACTA outside of special scenarios as ship must drop a shield for the entire firing phase and the results of the action are iffy to say the least as their is only a one third chance of success and that gives you a random result.

In contrast, transporting Marines in other star fleet universe games is a more manageable risk as the shield is only down for 1/4 of the turn and with the proportional movement, you can potentially transport your Marines aboard then turn the downed shield safely away from the enemy before they can do significant damage to you. The tactic still carries risk, but also has a greater potential reward as you choose the target of the attack and so target critical enemy systems.

With that in mind, I thought about making these changes to the Transport Marines action.

Marines raiding an enemy ship are not sent to cause random mayhem, but to target a specific system. When Marines are beamed aboard an enemy, the target of the raid is declared. Valid targets include any ship trait, any weapon system, or any critical hit system. If the raid succeeds, mark the trait or weapon system as damaged and inoperable – the system cannot be used until repaired. A trait or system damaged by a raid may be repaired using the same procedure as a critical hit (and in place of repairing a critical hit unless conducting AHD).
The shield to be transported through must be dropped at the end of the ship’s movement. The marines may be transported at the end of the ship’s movement or firing. The transporting ship will attempt to reactivate the shield as soon as possible. If the ship is targeted by an enemy ship through the downed shield, make an opposed crew quality test. If the transporting ship wins the test, it may raise the downed shield before the attack. If the marines have not been transported before the shield is raised, the Transport Marines Special Action is voided.

Any thoughts? Can you see using your transporters as a valid option under this scheme?

 

[SneakyPete]

I like it!

 

[Rambler]

More serious work on Marines will probably have to wait until Troop Ships and Boarding Actions hit ACTASF. That said there are some good thoughts here.

I like the choose your target and agree you should be able to but, simplify it some more. You can target and reduce a Ships Trait or Weapon System by one with no repair possible. Sorta like the AntiDrone reduces when you roll a One.

As far as the Shield goes instead of using a opposing roll to snap them back up just make the burn through on the Facing Arc to your Target a 5 and 6 or a 4 through 6.

 

[TheBeerPope]

Its and interesting concept. I will admit that I am a bit of a rules purest. I don't like changing rules, because in my experience, it almost always leads to an imbalance somewhere along the line. With that being said, the teleport marines ability does need to be changed somehow to make it a bit more useful. Personally i think something as simple as just making the teleportation happen at the end of the ships fire phase would make it more likely to happen.

But with that said, i do find your ideas very interesting.

 

[Myrm]

I have to agree Transporting is very much more damgerous in ACtA than previous SFU games, plus there is no general boarding combat, just hit and run equivalent. So its a little less useful.

What we have in ACtA is a full turn of total vulnerability in that shield area and an inability to time manage the action to do it and then turn away. In SFB only part of the turn is vulnerable, but its very vulnerable and while you can turn away that takes weapons out of arc.

So to simulate the partial but definitely present vulnerability I can think of two methods that essentially mean more damage over the turn for a transporting ship.

In both methods the shield rating is maintained intact but where you previously had no shield for a whole turn the following is substituted - either
1) All weapons gain Multi-Hit 2 if they don't have it, or double their multihit if they had it already.
or
2) Penetration of shield occur on a 5-6.

Im not sure which is most balanced or accurately reflects previous games effects in the ACtA , Both the above mean the ship is vulnerable in the arc under threat, but it is not an entire turn of no shield - the more damage option is a simple 'time by risk calculation' - easy but also doesnt entirely simulate the previous versions type of risk. The second puts a big risk of internal damage which seems a better simulation of the previous game styles, but is a change to a central rule and might get missed more easily.

There is of course the perfectly reasonable argument that in ACtA this is a big fleet battle, and frankly such boarding actions are best kept for special scenarios as in the midst of major fleet action - sitting around taking prize captures is not the best idea, unlike the smaller single ship/small squadron actions covered by the previous games - so just keep it as it is.....I see this as a very compelling argument.

 

[Iain McGhee]

Interesting ideas certainly, although I'm not convinced that it wouldn't be a bit overpowered in a typical ACTA game where you could have multiple ships jump on a shieldless enemy with relatively little risk attached compared to the current rules, especially if you could choose your target (those four D7s, 20 Marines on that Kirov's Dilithium Chamber please, Kaboom !!!). Without the faceted shield arcs and proportional movement of the source games the target is a lot more vulnerable to transporter raids, so I think making it a bit riskier to accomplish is a fair trade-off.

Besides, with no current rules for capturing or any need to disable rather than destroy it's far simpler and faster to just plaster a shieldless ship with weapons fire to take it out

 

[locarno24]

Besides, with no current rules for capturing or any need to disable rather than destroy it's far simpler and faster to just plaster a shieldless ship with weapons fire to take it out

That's the key problem, really. A couple of marines may give me a critical hit - but at that range, against a ship with no shields, firing a pair of Phaser 2's will do the same thing...without needing to drop my own shields.

In Noble Armada, boarding is a huge deal. In fact, my fleet's ships are pretty much 'just the things the Grimson assault troops stand on whilst they're heading towards your fleet'. I get that transporters can't beam through shields in this game - that's just the way Star Fleet physics works, the same as a ship not being able to fire whilst under stealth (i.e. cloak). Equally, I get that since these are alien races who won't switch sides rather than conscripted crew who'll fight for whoever currently has a rifle pointed at them, you shouldn't be able to 'take over' a ship - you'd need too many men and your marines don't know what they're doing.

But making yourself vulnerable in order to launch an attack that's generally not as good as just shooting just doesn't make sense.

Perhaps resurrecting a B5 concept might work - a boarded ship that surrenders won't change sides, but you might force it out of the battle; something akin to the old Stand Down! special action?

If your marines have been killed and there are still enemy marines on board, the unit essentially gets forced to stand down (assuming you don't fire on it, if you do it'll fight to the death!) unless rescued by other friendly marines (from another ship).